


Birthday Secrets

by Stryfe



Series: Love for Stryfe [1]
Category: Marvel, X-Men - All Media Types
Genre: AU, Alternate Universe, Apocalypse being kind of a good dad, Clones, Father and Son, Horsemen, Mentions of Cable, Stryfe's birthday, he's still an asshole though
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-25
Updated: 2016-11-25
Packaged: 2018-09-07 13:08:40
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,633
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8802034
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Stryfe/pseuds/Stryfe
Summary: Apocalypse reminisces a little as he watches Stryfe on his birthday.





	

**Author's Note:**

> All characters belong to their respective owners (Marvel, etc.). My stories may not be posted elsewhere or otherwise used or changed without my sole permission.

Stryfe; It was no secret to any of his servants how much he’d favoured the boy.

 

When he’d been young, Stryfe had gotten away with everything. Childish pranks on En Sabah Nur himself and his numerous subjects (including his Horsemen), excellent training in every aspect of his life from war to education in various topics like the sciences save for his psionics, which were still too underdeveloped to be trained properly. Even when the child had fought on the battlefield, he had been there, watching from the shadows, and keeping his son safe. If not him, then his Horsemen were there, doing it for him.

Despite his complete and utter disappointment a few years later when he’d found out Stryfe was a clone, he hadn’t left his son without protection. To say the least, Stryfe had been his most favorite child in centuries, despite being a copy and not his biological child.

Perhaps… that was why he’d been so harsh on Stryfe, particularly after finding out he was a clone. He wanted Stryfe to rise above the limitations being a clone burdened him with, to see his child grow strong where all others had crumbled.

He could still remember so many years ago when he’d first found Stryfe and had brought him home. On their way back to the his holy temples, Stryfe had reached out with tiny hands and fingers, grabbing curiously at Nur’s giant blue fingers, wanting to hold one or perhaps try to figure out what it was. He hadn’t even come close to fully grasping his finger but it wasn’t for a lack of trying since he’d kept at it until Nur had tucked his hands back inside the cloak before they got too cold.

At the oldest, Stryfe couldn’t have been more than a year old; his height, size, and blood samples had said as much. In addition to what his lab had told him of the boy, Stryfe had started walking a few months later, all of it starting with a single step towards Nur when he’d back up from Stryfe to talk to his horseman, who’d entered with updates on the Askani. At that moment, when Stryfe had taken a single step, Nur couldn’t recall feeling more proud over anything else in his life.

Those months of Stryfe’s young childhood had gone by fast, because it had felt like seconds when Stryfe’s second birthday, the day he’d found him, came around once more. Two years old and making happy noises as he sat on the floor, covered with a warm, plush blanket, playing with a toy he’d been given and repeating the same few words he’d learned: ‘Da-da,’ ‘No,’ and ‘cheep cheep.’ (He still hadn’t figured out where Stryfe had gotten the cheep cheep noise one from, but he could only assume that one of the servants had told Stryfe about birds of chickens and made the noise in front of him. It was the first noise that he heard.  _Every. Morning._ )

That year, as he recalled, had only been him and his Horsemen, making sure no one could attempt anything on Stryfe’s life while he was still so vulnerable. Stryfe, the endearing child, had kicked happily as he’d been picked up only to start trying to bite Nur’s fingers, the poor child still teething. His soft brown mop of hair, with a few strands of white starting near the tip, and soft blue eyes that looked everywhere with an insatiable curiosity. His little alligator, still trying to bite all of Nur’s index finger, finally pulled off when one of the Horsemen, War, held out a present wrapped loosely in cloth to the child.

Stryfe tried grabbing at the cloth as it came near, little hands eager to touch and play with everything they could get to. The toy, in Stryfe’s eagerness to play with the cloth, had fallen towards the floor when he tugged at the soft cloth, crooning ecstatically and holding the cloth, not the toy, up towards his father, saying, “ _Da-da, cheep cheep! Cheep cheep!_ ” Back then, so innocent and carefree, Stryfe had been ecstatic just to receive anything from anyone. You could have given the child a potato and he would have hugged it and rolled on it as if it was the greatest gift imaginable and he wanted no one else to touch it, only for him to sit up a moment later and either offer it to someone or throw it towards the first place he saw.

When he’d caught the toy telekinetically and handed it to Stryfe, he’d started kicking his little legs with joy, practically screeching out his happiness and holding on to all the gifts he’d gotten, not willing to let a single one out of his sight until he’d finished playing with them.

That celebration, and the few that had followed, had been one of the times that Apocalypse wished he could have captured and kept close as if they could have saved him from the rift that had destroyed his and Stryfe’s relationship to what it was today; nothing more than a race to see who could kill the other fastest.

 

Today was that same day, when he’d found Stryfe so many years ago. So many memories, so many emotions, both ‘good’ and ‘bad.’ His child was clever and smart and he’d fended for himself well, despite being a clone and pitifully obsessed with trying to kill Cable to prove his worth. He had to make sure all his children were strong, even if he knew that Stryfe could be so much more than Cable if he would let go of the requirement that the original needed to die in order for him to be superior. His son _is_ better than Cable and would have his father’s admission of that if he simply moved in the right direction.

Perhaps that was why, despite Stryfe leaving him dying for ten plus years, he stood here in his son’s hidden home, his lab, looking at his son lying on the bed. He knew the expression that Stryfe had on his face well; he’d worn it himself many years ago when he’d endured through Baal’s training and tortures. So much self-hatred, so much anger and rage at himself and the world, and an unending wave of sadness and pain. His son was stuck in the same rut he’d once been in, wishing he could have never existed.

Perhaps it was that that had driven him here today, on Stryfe’s birthday, to give his son a nudge in the right direction or to help him find a purpose that would give him the edge he needed to keep surviving in more ways than just staying alive physically. Perhaps... it was because Nur knew that to have no one at that point in his life had been a miserable place even for himself. No one could say he was sentimental, or that he cared for Stryfe. He gave his aid to all mutants who asked for his aid, even if they never… verbally asked for it, his son, Stryfe, included...

Walking out into an area of Stryfe’s lab that had some clear tables, Nur placed down everything he’d brought with him: A large cake and plenty of sweets and teas he’d made (Not _too_ old fashioned, so that Stryfe never knew it was him), various gifts and materials for his lab and research, a few weapons here and there, and, for a change in pace, several well-made cloaks in varying colors and, one that had made him worried about Stryfe’s reaction a bit, a granddaughter of Bastet’s (His poor child had suffered greatly when Bastet had been slaughtered by the Askani), hidden inside a box with a note letting him know as much.

With everything set out in a lovely array, Nur, who’d kept himself hidden, triggered the alarm in the area and leaned against the wall to watch Stryfe discover the presents. When Stryfe came rushing in, gun at the ready, he looked startled and suspicious at the items Nur had placed on the table. Looking around and ordering his computer to search the entire lab for any signs of life, the computer came up empty handed thanks to Nur’s influence and had told Stryfe they’d appeared from nowhere.

It was thirty minutes later before Stryfe had willingly given up the search for the intruder to come inspect the gifts, staring in confusion at everything on the table and looking, most curiously, at the box with holes for air, which held the sleeping kitten. Stryfe’s frowned softly at the note he saw on the box, wishing him a happy birthday, and opened it cautiously. His son’s eyes went wide at the kitten inside, a breed that could only be found within Apocalypse’s own highly secured temples. When Stryfe read that note inside, Apocalypse swore he could feel his heart squeeze as Stryfe ignored the rest of the gifts to pick up the kitten after he’d read the note with it inside, giving a smile like he once had when he was just two years old, eyes tearing up as he held it close. The kitten mewed softly as Stryfe pet it, rubbing happily against Stryfe as he sat down against the tables, bringing his knees up to keep the kitten close.

As he watched his son smile genuinely for the first time in decades, Nur could feel the ghost of the same expression creeping back onto his own face.

It may have been no secret when Stryfe was a child, but even if survival of the fittest demanded otherwise, Stryfe was still **_his_** child and he would help his children as he saw fit.

If only he could tell Stryfe now just how _proud_ he was of his son.


End file.
